I’m Nobody, Who Are You: The Power of Understanding Your Brand

Look around you. Everywhere you go, every single advertisement or logo or shoe or movie or poster or postcard you see has a story to tell, and that story is what draws you into the brand. If you don’t understand your brand, your values, or your customers, it’s going to be difficult to create a cohesive message (and it’s going to be even more difficult to analyze your results properly).

Make Up Your Mind

The power of your brand will come in its ability to generate one idea and one “self” across multiple platforms. Whether you’re sending out emails, meeting people at work events, or passing out business cards at a conference, you want to stay centered around what your brand’s goals are.

Uncover Your Inner Brand

Unlocking your brand’s power will come after quiet reflection, a lot of questioning, and perhaps a few really big cups of coffee.

Design is the practice of intent. It is being able to fully consider what we want to bring into being as the first act of creating it. The creation process is managing the tension between what we intend to create and the current condition we are in in relation to this creation. If we consider the “why” behind what we are doing, then we want to be able to create a brand to convey this in support of the “what” we are creating. The brand development process is vital to drawing this out. – Peter Ruppe in an interview with Rising Above the Noise.

Brand Flexibly

You’re creating a brand for forever right? You want something that can continue to grow and change for the next 10, 20, 30+ years. You want to ensure that your brand is able to be adjusted. This has more to do with your ideas than your brand’s “face,” but it’s still an important lesson. If you create a brand that is too rigid, too set in one time period or niche, or too exclusive, it might not be able to grow as your customers do.

Take it Home

Our best advice is not to rush it. Take your ideas home with you. Sit on them a bit. Let them grow organically as you develop other aspects of your brand. You don’t have to have everything figured out all at once, and sometimes, the most genius ideas come when we least expect them.